Massive Anti-Trash Protests in Russian North Reflect Fears Shiyes ‘Only Start of Environmental Catastrophes’

Paul Goble

            Staunton, December 8 – Because even the cities in the Russian North are small, it is sometimes difficult to know what the numbers of participants in demonstrations mean. But today, 10,000 people – or one in every six residents of Kotlas – marched to protest Shiyes and other Russian government plans to dispose of Moscow’s trash in the region.

            For a Moscow demonstration to be equivalent in size, more than two million residents of the capital would have to go into the streets, a number approached only rarely and not in recent years (29.ru/text/politics/66389302/, sobkorr.org/news/5DEE1E26247D3.html and dvinatoday.ru/news/v-kotlase-prokhodit-masshtabnyy-antimusornyy-miting/).

            Those take part in the protest there and in Syktyvkar, the capital of the Komi Republic, were animated not only by a desire to express their support for those who have been standing against plans to build a dump for Moscow’s wastes in Shiyes but also by fears that Shiyes is only the first of Moscow’s plans to turn the North into a waste dump.

            There is currently a bill before the Duma that would open the way for more trash disposal facilities in the region, something residents are convinced would have the most negative consequences for the environment and for their health and the health of their children (echo.msk.ru/blog/statya/2550875-echo/).

            Given how cold it is in the Russian North in December where it is already deep in winter, it is truly impressive that so many people have come out. That should serve as a warning to officials in Moscow that Northerners are not going to roll over and play dead as Moscow goes about destroying their environment.